Vincent and the Doctor is my absolute favorite episode by far from Season 5 with Matt Smith as the Doctor. It was a wonderfully written episode with the right enough of funny and somehow, it touches on Van Gogh’s depression like I’ve never seen before despite the mix of science fiction elements. Tony Curran’s portrayal of Vincent Van Gogh was amazing and it was absolutely moving.

I bawled like a freakin’ baby by the end of the episode.

Despite having only one appearance in the series, Curran as Van Gogh made a deep impact on plenty of people. During his panel, Curran said that he was at a Whole Foods market when a fan asked him if he played Vincent Van Gogh in Doctor Who. When he replied affirmatively to her question, the woman started to cry and told him about her own struggles with depression. I believe an actor, or any artist, should be proud of themselves the minute they’ve made such an emotional impact on at least one other person. It’s beautiful!

Personally, Vincent and the Doctor made me cry because it was easy to relate to the artist’s struggle and the constant self-doubt. Curran managed to embrace all of these emotions in a very strong and realistic way. I think Curran’s Vincent Van Gogh will become timeless and one of the more unforgettable Doctor Who episodes. It was definitely my favorite episode from the Matt Smith season.

You can follow the Space Pirate Queen on twitter @punkagogo.

Regina Carpinelli is our Lady Geek guest and she gives us all the exclusive announcements on Stan Lee’s Comikaze Expo as presented by POW Entertainment and Elvira, Mistress of the Dark. We got all the exciting news first because we have a special love connection with Regina. It’s true. Plus, we go really deep when it comes to My Little Ponies… really deep.

]]> http://www.defectivegeeks.com/2012/02/22/ep-49-regina-carpinelli/feed/ 0 comikaze expo,conventions,elvira,los angeles,podcast,regina carpinelli,stan lee Regina Carpinelli is our Lady Geek guest and she gives us all the exclusive announcements on Stan Lee's Comikaze Expo as presented by POW Entertainment and Elvira, Mistress of the Dark. We got all the exciting news first because we have a special love ... Regina Carpinelli is our Lady Geek guest and she gives us all the exclusive announcements on Stan Lee's Comikaze Expo as presented by POW Entertainment and Elvira, Mistress of the Dark. We got all the exciting news first because we have a special love connection with Regina. It's true. Plus, we go really deep when it comes to My Little Ponies... really deep. Team DefectiveGeeks yes 1:21:51 http://www.defectivegeeks.com/2012/02/21/gallifrey-one-2012-voice-actors/ http://www.defectivegeeks.com/2012/02/21/gallifrey-one-2012-voice-actors/#comments Wed, 22 Feb 2012 01:38:53 +0000 Space Pirate Queen http://www.defectivegeeks.com/?p=6102

I didn’t really realize how big the Doctor Who universe was until I went to Gallifrey One this past weekend. I didn’t realize that there is also an ongoing audio series! They are known as the Big Finish Doctor Who audio stories.  I attended the panel called Travels With the Doctor with three of the voice actors: Beth Chalmers, Lisa Greenwood and Philip Olivier.

Olivier is particularly popular among Whovians who were familiar with the audio stories. I think it was mostly because he’s good looking and he plays one of the Doctor’s companions, a character named Hex. Greenwood also plays a companion to the 6th Dcotor named Flip and Chalmers plays a companion to the 7th Doctor named Raine. Love their characters’ names, personally.

They were all very charming and funny on stage. Greenwood, in particular, was a girl after my own heart since she seems to have a bigger crush on David Tennant than I do. Although she seems to be slowly moving to the Matt Smith camp too. There were a lot of jokes about Olivier taking off his shirt while Chalmers egged him on. They were all big fans of the series themselves and spoke about what a great feeling it was to be asked to play a companion to the Doctor.

You can follow the Space Pirate Queen on twitter @punkagogo.

Last year, I became a fan of the BBC series, Doctor Who. I am going to assume that most of the people who reads this blog know what I’m talking about. I went to the annual fan convention, Gallifrey One, in Los Angeles this past weekend to get my Whovian on. Although I attended on my own, I had a lot of fun just walking around the convention and checking out the cosplayers. Fans even built life size Daleks that function! The K-9 in the photo above moves on its own and talks. I’ll be putting up videos later. There were a lot of awesome cosplayers.

I was trying very hard to not be a creep on all the guys dressed like the 10th Doctor… I almost followed one to the men’s room. Ironically, I ended up not taking a lot of photos of all the 10th Doctor cosplay because I was too afraid I’d come off as a crazy, drool-y fangirl. Oh well. There is always next year to creep again, right?

I had fun celebrating the fandom with bigger Whovians. I ended up buying a TARDIS necklace and a wind-up Dalek from the dealer’s room. I had to go home with a Dalek, man! My cats are frightened of my little, moving Dalek now.

The majority of the crowd were younger fans but there were still a variety to the attendees and the older fans were very much present. There were also very young children dressed like little Doctors at the convention. Love seeing the guys dressed like the 1st to the 8th Doctors. Though I confess, I still need to go through and watch the original series myself.

It was a fun convention and I’m definitely going to go back next year. Hopefully, by then, there will be an Asian character from the series I can possibly cosplay? ;) Either that or I’ll just be an Asian Amy Pond or be Martha.

Cutest little 11th Doctor!

The stuff nightmares are made of.

You can follow the Space Pirate Queen on twitter @punkagogo.

Soulless by Gail Carriger is a steampunk, romance, detective novel with vampires and werewolves. Now wait, don’t go all “I hate sparkly vampires” on me. Within the first chapter (nearly the first page), the main character Alexia Tarabotti, smacks a vampire in the gonads with a brass parasol.

This book is a huge mixture of genres but Gail Carriger deftly navigates them all with wit and sarcasm. Alexia is a smart mouth spinster (at the ripe old age of 25) who is a ‘preternatural’ which is the opposite of supernatural. Her touch undoes the supernatural powers of the vampires and werewolves. The head of the Bureau of Unnatural Registry (BUR) is Lord Maccon, a werewolf. Alexia is the bane of his existence since she always seems to end up at the scene of crimes.

The use of an anti-power provides a nice twist to the usual trappings of the vampire/werewolf genre. It means Alexia isn’t a damsel in distress or obsessed with getting bitten by either side to become one of them. She also isn’t a little waif of a thing. Carriger goes out of her way to describe her as a woman who enjoys her food and has a full figure. After so many years of the Twilight Waifs, it was a nice change.

The story follows Alexia as she (and Lord Maccon) investigate rogue vampires appearing (unregistered) in London and causing trouble and the disappearance of loner werewolves. Lord Maccon, ever the gentleman, doesn’t want Alexia involved, but why the hell would that stop her?

I could not put this book down. I read it in day and was laughing out loud at least once a chapter. The mystery and romance is pretty predictable, but the narration and characters make it such a fun read. I wanted to get right to my sewing machine and make a bustle dress.

Best part? This is book one of five, so I’ve got more to look forward to! Hope they arrive soon.

Gail Carriger has a fun blog here.

She’s also going to have a manga version of the book published soon. Keep a look out!

While everyone has been focused on the men-in-tights superhero movies coming out this summer, I’ve been quietly sitting in my corner, salivating over The Hobbit movies. I am incredibly excited to the point that I will possibly cry myself to sleep every night out of pure happiness until the first movie comes out in December. At that point, I will be crying during the entire movie quiet possibly.

Also, I love technology and the internet because director, Peter Jackson, has been uploading production videos from the set onto his Facebook page.

There was a time when you had to wait for the DVDs to come out in order to see behind the scenes features. Well, there was a time when you didn’t know what the hell was going on behind the cameras and everything was done with magic (by the house of wizardry of Steven Spielberg). The first time I saw a director started blogging and uploading production videos as they happened was Edgar Wright for the Scott Pilgrim movie. It was awesome.

I wholeheartedly support this growing trend and getting a glimpse of The Hobbit as it’s happening is so amazing. The latest production video (#5) takes you on location to Hobbiton where they’ve rebuilt the whole town as a permanent fixture. Yes, that means as a tourist, you can actually visit the set in the future because they’re not going to tear it down! HOW COOL IS THAT?!

Elijah Wood was also in this video and he mentioned how he turned 19 years old on the set of the Lord of the Rings movie and now he’s 30 years old and back at Hobbiton. That’s a little crazy… especially since he doesn’t look like he’s aged even one year from 19. What is your secret, Elijah? What is the secret to your lasting youthful face? Also the fact that it made me feel old too.

Check out all the videos on Peter Jackson’s Facebook fanpage:
www.facebook.com/PeterJacksonNZ

I’m planning a trip to New Zealand in 2014. Maybe I’ll see some of you Hobbit lovers out there too. We’ll drink some ale and dance around barefoot together!

You can follow the Space Pirate Queen on twitter @punkagogo.

The Lady Geeks talk about vampires. Again. Vampire wine. Fortune Cookie also tells her Valentine’s Day story of romance and true luuuurve! Happy one year anniversary to her and her boy!

I must admit I’m normally the type of girl that goes after villains, rarely good guys, and even more rarely ones that apologize before cursing (how adorable). There is just something about Agent Cooper, though. Part of his charm is his penchant for local horticulture (“Douglas Firs!”), Tibet, and cherry pie. I also love his life philosophy.

This video is one of my favorites:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPkNtg3Fvwk

I think that’s a lesson we should all adopt for our lives.

It certainly doesn’t hurt that the actor, Kyle MacLachlan, is one fine stud. I must confess before watching Twin Peaks I mainly saw this actor as “The Captain” from How I Met Your Mother. By the way, if you have not seen those episodes, do so immediately. Dale Cooper is a man of honor and all around a decent guy. There’s one episode where one of the lady characters tries to seduce him, and he turns her down in the most respectful and honorable way. It was the type of scenario that makes us girls collectively sigh and then say, “What a guy”.

Very little seems to get Dale Cooper down. His attitude is always sunny and he is constantly endeared by small town life, even if the small town is plagued by an evil spirit named Bob who is from the forest and killing young women (watch the show, it will make sense). Also, I’m such a sucker for a man in a suit and, oh man, he works that suit. That combined with his fabulous hair is the next best thing to porn for me.

Last, and definitely not least, the man loves a good cup of black coffee. Seriously, he really loves it.

If you’re a fan of Dale Cooper, or just a fan of Twin Peaks, let us clink our coffee mugs to this damn fine character.

Nerd Girls: The Rise of the Dorkasaurus by Alan Lawrence Sitomer is a book written for pre-teens. For someone my age, I enjoyed the books for a lot of reasons and possibly related to the characters a little.

The story is about Maureen, a chubby, sarcastic and intelligent thirteen-year old girl. She’s quick witted and very self-aware, unlike most girls her age. She knows she’s kind of an outcast and a nerd. She is aware of her “place” in the grand scheme of middle school politics. Combined with her resentment towards her father leaving her family, she’s a pretty jaded little girl.

The ThreePees are the “mean girls” of the school. They are the pretty and popular girls who like to pick on the less fortunate. We’ve all known the type, right? The kind of cruel girls with no fear of really hurting another person as long as it’s entertaining for them… as long as it makes them feel better about themselves. Yes, I remember how rough my middle school class was with the mean girls picking on the dorky girls. Kids can just be such brats.

Maureen reluctantly makes friends with the other two female outcasts in her class. Allergy Alice, who is literally allergic to anything and Beanpole Barbara, the super tall and clumsy girl. These characters are fairly stereotypical “outcast” types – the fat girl, the sick girl and the awkward girl. Sitomer picks very obvious “dorky” traits for the Nerd Girls but he wrote the story in a very charming and simple way. The Nerd Girls teams up to join the talent show and give the ThreePees a run for their money.

Despite the stereotypes – like Maureen’s binge eating on cupcakes since she’s the “fat” girl – I wouldn’t be completely against younger girls reading this book. Maureen’s intelligence is a good trait for her character. I love her nicknames for the people she meets, especially ‘Department Store Mom’ and ‘Department Store Dad.’ The friendship between her, Alice and Barbara was written in a realistic way which I think becomes the strength of the story. The lessons in friendship and accepting yourself during these very awkward years is the important lesson. To find the friends who would love you for who you are, no matter how bad you think the situation is.

I recommend this book to parents who may have middle schoolers who are struggling. Or perhaps, if your child is the “popular” girl, she needs to read this too and learn a little bit about compassion towards her own peers.

It’s a fun book for an adult geek like myself to read.

Visit the book’s website at www.thenerdgirlsworld.com

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My lady friends and I celebrated GIRLentine’s Day this year for the first time on the night of February 13th. Fun presents and cupcakes were exchanged with each other. Vampire wine was drank.

Yes, that’s right. Vampire wine. We celebrated at the Vampire Lounge and Tasting Room in Beverly Hills. Although the decor of the small bar wasn’t what we expected, we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. It was less vampire goth and more of a throwback Hollywood movie type, swanky bar. Still, the wine was very delicious! The lounge was super chill and a great place to drink and talk to friends.

We had so much fun doing this that we decided that this will become an annual tradition… yes, just for the girls. Ha!

Kayla of Happy Hoodie, Yume Ninja and Chubby Bunny of Bubble Punch.

Party planner extraordinaire, Chubby Bunny, was the mastermind behind this little get-together. We spent the night upstairs at the “Vampire Lair”, away from the rest of the bar goers. I am sure we were loud enough that our conversations were heard by all downstairs but we felt like we got to have a private party anyways. It was a plain, good ol’ time exchanging “crazy exes” stories, bitching about work and putting on Thor tattoos. That’s how we girls do.

The one bartender and employee that night was the best. His name is Rob and he works at the bar every Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. Make sure to visit him and tip him well! He took care of us and our drinky needs and even willingly put a Chris Hemsworth tattoo on his arm.

A glass of wine can be pretty pricey at this place. I would recommend purchasing a bottle or two to split with your group of friends.

You can follow the Space Pirate Queen on twitter @punkagogo.